KIDNEY-BEANS. 



69 



however, of propagating and cultivating is the same in both cases, 

 except that the dwarfs require smaller distances than the climbers, 

 and that the latter are grown with the assistance of poles, which 

 the former are not. This is a plant, very different, indeed, in its 

 nature, from the f eve, or English bean : it is a native of a warm 

 climate ; very sensible of frost, and only one degree more hardy 

 than the cucumber, and not at all more hardy than the squash. 

 The very slightest frost checks the growth of the plant and changes 

 the colour of the leaves ; and the leaves are absolutely scorched 

 up by frosts not sufficient to produce ice any thicker than gauze ; 

 so that we have here a summer plant, to all intents and pur- 

 poses ; a plant that must be cultivated under cover of some sort 

 except at times when there is a complete absence of frost. The 

 general time for sowing kidney-beans, in ground quite open when 

 there is no shelter of any sort, and where covering is wholly im- 

 practicable, is the first of May. I beg the reader to bear this in 

 mind ; I have tried the thing often enough ; nine times out of ten 

 earlier sowing does no good ; and even sowing at this time has 

 frequently been found too early. I have had my kidney beans all 

 cut off in the month of June ; and, therefore if crop be the 

 object, the first week in May is quite early enough, especially for 

 the climbers. But, people wish to have some small portion, at 

 any rate, of so capital a vegetable as early as they possibly can. 

 Those who have the means have them all the winter in hot 

 houses ; but a hot-bed or hot-beds are insufficient for such a pur- 

 pose. In our case, therefore, we must be content with the south 

 face of a wall, which, if made proper use of for this purpose, will 

 produce beans from twelve to twenty days earlier than they can be 

 had in perfectly open ground. A single row put in, two inches 

 deep, close to the wall, the beans at about three inches apart in 

 the row, about the tenth of April, and earthed up to the seed leaf 

 as soon as they are above ground, and kept carefully screened from 

 frost every night by the leaning of a board or some other thing 

 against the wail ; a single row of these beans, being also of the 

 earliest sort, will, in the south of England, produce beans fit to 

 gather in the last week of June ; while the same sort of beans 

 sowed in the open ground, at the same time, will either rot in the 

 ground and never come up ; or will, after coming up, be so injured 

 by the weather as to be overtaken by beans sowed early in May, 

 and will, after all, not produce a crop half so abundant. A good 



